Well, if you've been keeping up with the RTS genre of games, you'd know that Battle for Middle Earth II is out. Even the demo was out earlier (but the demo for this one is HUGE!)

Now, the gameplay.

Your basic RTS. Build units, send them in to destroy. But like the previous game, you can only build a certain number of different units. Of course the basic point of RTSes now is only have a certain number of units in play at once. This one is no exception.

Unlike the previous game, there are more races. Men, Elves, Dwarves, Mordor, Isengard, and Goblins. That's right, no Gondor or Rohan. They are one faction this time around. I assume that they'd have the most amount of units you can build, but the amount is pretty balanced. There's also way more bonuses and heroes for each side. Only because you can make your own hero (very limited amounts of options for appearance, but you can make your own hero. Someone stronger than Gandalf perhaps).

The graphics are very close to the previous title in the series. It's not like you can really change too much. Adding new units and textures is one of the changes. Why mess with a good thing?

One part I loved about this one was the ability to make your own base. You can build walls where you want, buildings where you want, and you can have many resource points rather than relying on one single area. But also this resource point part is a shortfall, because you must spread them out. They're more effective spread out than in one concentrated part.

One of the BEST additions to this game is the War of the Ring mode. Think Rome: Total War (or even more recently Star Wars: Empire at War) in the Lord of the Rings world. Middle Earth is yours to conquor. Build then destroy! The world map is where the most strategy takes place (everyone moves at the same time in 'phases'. The battles take place in the regular maps. And every battle map is like a skirmish map. Except you start with units. Also, you can build up units while on your battle map. This is different than Rome: Total War, because you might be able to turn a disadvantage to a huge advantage if you can drive the opponents into a wall where they can't build any new troops.

Now, one VERY welcome change is the AI. They're smarter. While in the original, the AI only attacked you from ONE direction, same thing with most RTSes, this one, the opponents will actually attack the side of your base, even on the easy difficulty (went on easy in the demo to learn the changes, and was defeated so easily because of the side). It's not the BEST RTS in the world, and it's not the worst, but it's pretty fun for the way it is. I'll get plenty of life out of the single player modes. More than I got in Battle for Middle Earth.